https://lcme.org/directory/accredited-u-s-programs/
At one point the AMA did lobby Congress to restrict the number of residency slots but they long since reversed that position and now lobby for an expansion.
You would think that Hospitals would be able and willing to pay for residents.
Something doesnt add up.
Why would you think that? Pay... out of their profit margins... to reduce their profit margins? Or do you mean in la-la-land where American CEOs make investments that are likely to show returns only 10+ years out in the future?
Anyways, a huge number of hospitals are non profit and still have the residency issue. There is something systemically fucked going on if a hospital can't turn a profit on a MD with "only” 8 years of postsecondary education, and needs 4-6 years more
As a hospital, they also have no incentive to treat people earlier in disease progression with less expensive care or anything. Just let the ailments fester until they have to be rescued with the most expensive interventions on the planet.
No one said anything about "not turning a profit." If you think a profit-seeking organization exists only to turn a profit, you misunderstand the enterprise.
You are not engaging with the question posed, merely listing a number of cynicisms tangential at best, or factually incorrect at worst.
Independent practices generally cant operate licensed residency programs. Similarly, your model of hospital behavior ironically requires them to forgo money could make today to cash in on expensive interventions decades in the future - exactly what you claim they are incapable of doing.
Last, you claim doctors are a dime a dozen, yet hospitals pay 4, 5, or 600k to employ them, and frequently close due to an inability to secure them at reasonable costs.